Her hand came up, reaching for the cutoff, and Tan'elKoth whispered, "Mother.... ?"
Her hand froze, suspended weightless in midreach, and her face went utterly blank.
"Mother?" Tan'elKoth said softly, gently, lovingly, in Lamorak's voice. "Mother, it's me. Don't you know me?"
The hard, cold lines of her face crumbled like a glacier breaking up into the sea. "Karl ... ?" she whispered, sounding suddenly sixty years younger. "Karl, is that you ... ? Am I dreaming?"
"Mother, I need you. Please. Help me."
Astonishment glistened in the corners of her ice-blue eyes. "Help you? Karl ... oh Karl, oh my god, Karl ..."
A single keystroke uploaded the file from Tan'elKoth's personal datacore: a digigraph of a snapshot he'd downloaded from the Studio security-video archives, when he'd been considering using Faith as a model for a sculpture he'd been planning. He'd never done the sculpture but he'd also never erased the digigraph. The frame-in-frame showed him a small version of what Avery would be seeing on her screen right now: a beautiful golden-haired child with a sunny smile and pale blue eyes.
"Do you know who this is, Mother? It's Faith Michaelson." "Michaelson?" Avery's face iced over, and her voice congealed. "The Michaelson? That's his daughter?"
"No, Mother," Tan'elKoth whispered. "That's Pallas Ril's daughter." Her eyes widened.
Tan'elKoth said, "That's my daughter."
"Your ... Karl, what—?"
"Mother, please," he whispered, letting his voice fade. "Please help me..."
"Karl—"
He stroked the cutoff.
He looked up. Lit by the cool glow of the blank screen, Kollberg leered at him, wiping something from his chin with the back of his hand. Tan'elKoth said, "It has begun."
And there came a day when the god of dust and ashes raised up its hammer against the dark angel.
The hammer was lifted piecemeal, and each piece was a person, and to each person the god of dust and ashes whispered: This do for me, and receive in payment your fondest desire.
Each person, each piece said yes, and in so saying became the hammer of the blind god.
EIGHT
A perfectly anonymous digitized voice cut through the dully roaring babble on the convention floor.
"Administrator Michaelson."
Hari looked up from the autograph book he was signing and saw his own face, fisheye distorted and reflected four times over in the mirror masks of a Social Police enforcement squad.
He couldn't breathe.
That instant stripped away Caine's success and fame; stripped away the thousands of fans who crowded around him in this immense overheated room; stripped the power of the Administrator caste and the status of the Studio Chairmanship; stripped every part of him that lay over his most fundamental baseline. The baseline of his soul was Labor.
Every Laborer knows that trouble with Soapy is the last trouble you ever have.
"Administrator Hari Khapur Michaelson. You are under arrest."
The crowd of fans drew back, muttering to each other and exchanging awed glances. He couldn't even tell which one of the soapies had spoken.
The exhibition hall flattened around him, ironing the stalls and the booths and every fan into painted images of themselves, as two-dimensional as cheap cover art; only the soapies still had solidity. The rumble of voices and music and the blare of PA announcements all settled into an insectile buzz that sounded like he had a housefly trapped inside his skull.
He coughed once, harshly. He wanted to ask On what charge? but the words stuck in his throat like a chunk of half-chewed meat. He stood nervelessly, unresisting, as one of the soapies turned him and bound his wrists behind his back with plastic stripcuffs. Two held his arms; another kept a shock baton at the ready.
The last of them extended a palmpad. "Where is this child?"
The screen of the palmpad showed a bright, cheerful image that he recognized: it was a souvenir photo, a couple of years old, from a visit to the Studio Curioseum. "Faith?" he said stupidly. "She's right over—"
He shut his mouth and clenched his teeth till his ears rang.
He had met with his fans right next to the KidZone, the huge complex of intertwined climbing tubes and game pods that dominated an entire corner of the exhibition hall. The KidZone swarmed with children; supervised by a double handful of Artisan au pairs, it was the place where offspring were deposited so their parents could visit the convention unencumbered. Faith was in a Leisure Call pod with a dozen or so other kids—Faith was the Caller, and half of them were already out, having either failed to follow an order or taken an order that wasn't preceded by "Leisure Calls." Two more were counted out even as Hari glanced up there. No surprise; Faith was lethal at Leisure Call.
What stopped Hari's mouth was a tall, slim woman with an iron-grey crewcut and a jaw like a fire axe. She stood at the chest-high fence surrounding the KidZone, her teeth bared in what might, on a human, have looked like a smile. She scanned the children inside with eyes cold as security cameras. She wore full Business dress, and four bodyguards with SynTech logos on their shirts kept the crowd from pressing too close to her.
Avery Shanks.
The soapy shoved the palmpad at him again. "Where is this child?" Hari said through his teeth, "Ask my fucking lawyer."
But even as he spoke, Shanks lifted her hand and pointed right at Faith up high in the game pod, and three of the SynTech guards moved through the gate of the KidZone.
"Shanks," Hari snarled. The ice that had lodged in his chest became instant flame. "Shanks! Leave her alone! You leave her the fuck alone!"
He lunged for her, but the soapies yanked his arms back painfully. The one with the shock baton moved its business end closer to his ribs, and he made himself stop; if he didn't, Faith would see the soapies beat him—maybe beat him to death. He couldn't do that to her.
At his shout, Shanks turned and gave him a good view of her shark-toothed grin. She came over, her bodyguard a muscle-bound shadow at her shoulder. "Hello, Hari," she said in a soft mockery of cheer. "Enjoying the convention?"
"If you touch my daughter, Shanks, I swear to you--"
The false cheer vanished instantly, revealing furious black triumph in-side her gem-blue eyes. "She's not your daughter," Shanks spat. "That's exactly the point."
Hari went numb. He couldn't feel his legs—either his bypass had shut down, or he was about to faint; he couldn't tell which.
"You see, I can touch her," Shanks said. "It's you that can't. A simple DNA test will show she's a Shanks. She's Business. You understand what that means, Michaelson? Do you?"
Hari couldn't answer; he couldn't draw breath enough to speak.
"She's too young to give consent. That means every single time you have ever touched her, you have committed Forcible Contact Upcaste." She bared her teeth, savage as a panther. "If I'd known about this six years ago, I could have had you broken and sent to a social camp for so much as changing her diaper."
He found his legs worked, after all. He lunged at her. But the soapies held him tight and the shock baton triggered against his ribs. They were almost gentle with him; instead of throwing him twitching to the floor, the charge from the baton only shot fire up his spine and made him sag. "Good, good," Shanks said. "Try again. I will enjoy watching these officers kill you."
"You can't hope this'll stand up," Hari said desperately. "I'm married to her mother—her mother can give consent—"
She looked at the soapies. "You heard."
"We heard."
"You've just established foreknowledge, Michaelson. You knew she's a Shanks. You've always known it. I'll see you under the yoke for this." "My wife—"
"Yes, where is your wife? Is she available to testify?"
"She's on Overworld," Hari ground out between his teeth. "You know she's on Overworld. That's why you're pulling this shit now."
"Mind your tone, Michaelson. Unless you liked that tap from the shock baton?"
"Where did you get the image?" Th
ere was only one copy of that shot: it was framed on his office desk at the Abbey. "Who gave you that picture?"
Shanks' eyes went distant and soft, and for a moment she did not speak. "It was sent to my message dump . . . ah, anonymously," she said finally. "Yes, anonymously."
Hari was coldly calculating whether he could yank free and get his teeth into her throat before the soapies could pull him down when he heard Faith say, "Daddy? What's going on? Where's Gramma?"
One of the SynTech bodyguards led her by the hand. She looked up at the Social Police with wide eyes that slowly filled with puzzlement and hurt. "He said Gramma was here," Faith said, a little petulantly. Gramma, to Faith, was Mara Leighton, Shanna's mother. She looked up at the body-guard who held her hand. "You shouldn't lie to a kid, Art'san. That's really, really bad."
Avery Shanks turned, six full feet of regal calm. "He didn't lie, child. I am your grandmother."
And seeing them together—the shape of their faces, even the way they both stood, looking at each other—even to Hari, the family resemblance was unmistakable. It went through him like another shot from the baton.
Faith frowned, and bit her lip. "Mommy's really upset." She looked up into Hari's eyes and said gravely, "She's coming home. She's really, really, really upset."
For one slack second, Hari was grateful—Oh, thank god, she'll straighten this shit out in a second—but then he realized what was at stake. He realized what would be lost if Pallas Ril left Overworld with her job unfinished. She would never get the chance to go back.
"No," he said. "No, Faith, no—she can't come home. Tell her I can handle it. I can handle it. Tell her to stay and finish her work. Stay there until I send for her."
Faith shook her head. "She's really upset." She turned and looked up into Shanks' cold blue eyes. "Mommy thinks you're a bad person."
Shanks pursed her bloodless lips. "What kind of sick fantasy have you spawned in this child's head?" She met his gaze for a full second of undisguised loathing, then nodded to the bodyguard. "Take her to the car."
"Faith—Faith, don't be afraid," Hari said. "I'll make it right—no matter what it takes, I'll make things come out right. I promise."
"Make things come out right?" Shanks said. "They already have." "Shanks," Hari said, just above a whisper. "Shanks, don't do this." "Businessman Shanks."
Cords in his neck winched Hari's head down. "Businessman Shanks." She smiled. "And that is how you will address this child, should you ever see her again." She waved to the SynTech goons. "Go on?'
"Daddy?" Faith's puzzlement turned to flat-out fear as the bodyguard picked her up. "Daddy, make him put me down!"
"Businessman ..." Hari ground out, "Please."
"Much better, Michaelson," Shanks said delightedly. "Let's have it again, a little louder. I want all your fans to hear you beg."
"Daddy, please—Daddy!"
The soapies parted the crowd, and the goon carried her toward the door. Shanks said, "Don't be shy, Michaelson. At least you have the chance to beg—which is more than you gave Karl."
The words forced their way out through his locked jaw. "You will suffer for this, you hatchet-faced cunt. You hear me? You got no fucking clue how deep this shitpool is. I will fucking drown you in it—"
"A threat?" Shanks interrupted, smiling. "Am I dreaming? Did you actually just threaten a Businessman in front of an entire Social Police enforcement squad?"
Faith began to struggle, but the bodyguard only held her tighter as he walked away. "Daddy, ow! He's hurting me! Daddy! Daddy, help!"
Hari threw himself blindly against the grip of the soapies. For one instant their hands loosened and he thought he might pull free, but the one with the shock baton gave him a shot right over his heart, and this time it wasn't gentle at all. Hari collapsed to the floor, twitching spastically. Faith didn't call to him anymore; now she just screamed like her world was ending.
Shanks knelt beside Hari's head, and he had never thought a human voice could carry so much hatred. "Every night for seven years, Hari Michaelson, I have cried myself to sleep. I've worn out three different cubes of For Love of Pallas Ril; I have watched you murder my son two thousand times. I want to quote you, now."
She leaned down as though to kiss him; her lips brushed his ear as she whispered, "Did you really think I'd let you live?"
2
Avery Shanks felt warm all over; she felt a satisfaction that another sort of woman would have called sexual. A kind of benignity rose within her as she looked down upon the lovely blond hair of Karl's daughter. If she wasn't careful, she might begin to smile.
Faith sat calmly and quietly beside Avery in the passenger cabin of her Cadillac limousine. Her initial fussing about being separated from Michaelson had stilled almost immediately upon liftoff Avery had looked upon this display of self-control so extraordinary in a child of six and thought that blood will tell, after all. This girl was unquestionably a Shanks.
"I will call you Faith," Avery instructed her, "and you shall call me Grandmaman. We are going to Boston together, where you shall live in a proper home, with proper servants, and shall attend a school proper to a young Businessman. Do you understand?"
Faith's eyes met hers, huge but level and unafraid. "Yes, Grandmaman."
She'd even captured the nasal whine of the antiquated French pronunciation. This child was so astonishingly apt—but she maintained her regal sternness with the ease of a lifetime's habit. It would not do to show any sign of warmth or weakness.
"You," she said, "are very well behaved."
"Thank you, Grandmaman."
Avery turned away to the window, muttering her surprise that a downcaste thug like Michaelson had managed to rear an even half-civilized child. An interval passed in silence.
"Grandmaman?"
"Yes?"
"What is a hatchet-faced cunt?"
Avery's left eyelid drooped as though she'd bitten into an impossibly sour pastille, and for one long moment her mouth clamped shut like a locked ledger—but then her thin, almost invisible lips bent into something close to a smile. "I suppose: I am," she said. "Give me your hand."
Faith dutifully offered her hand, and Avery took it. "That is not a proper word for young ladies of the Business caste," she said, and gave the back of the child's hand a brisk, stinging slap with two of her fingers, producing a sharp smack and a glitter of shocked moisture in Faith's eyes.
Faith bit her lip and took one deep, shuddering breath that threatened tears, but that was all. After a moment, she said, "You shouldn't hit me."
"It is also improper for a young lady of the Business caste to lecture her Grandmaman on propriety."
"You better not hit me again," Faith told her seriously. "Mommy wants me to behave while I'm with you. She told me to always mind you until Daddy comes for me. I'm s'posed to do whatever you say. But if you hurt me, she'll hurt you worse."
So. Here it was: the first clear evidence of the possibly irreparable harm done to this child by her degraded upbringing. Avery allowed a sigh to trickle from her long, straight nose, and nodded to herself. "First," Avery said precisely, "the man you call Daddy is not your father; he is--if he has any legal standing whatsoever, which is questionable—your stepfather."
"I know that," Faith said dismissively. "Did you think that was a secret? I know all about that."
"Do you?" That sour taste was back in her mouth; she had been entertaining fantasies of instructing this child on her true parentage, and on Michaelson's murder of her real father.
"Course. Mommy doesn't do secrets with me. She can't."
"Well. In any case, the man you call Daddy will not be coming for you," Avery continued. "In fact, you will never see him again, except in court, and perhaps on the net. Do not expect him, and you will not be dis appointed. Your mother engaged in criminal conspiracy with that man to deny you your birthright. Thus, her wishes and intentions are irrelevant; she has surrendered her parental rights. Do you understand this? They wanted to hurt you
. They do not love you."
Faith's only response was a patient silent stare.
Avery sighed again. "I understand how cruel these truths must seem, but truth is usually painful, Faith. Understanding this is the first part of growing up."
"You're the one that doesn't understand," Faith said serenely. "Mommy's with me right now. I can feel how much she loves me. And Daddy will come for me. If you do anything to hurt me, Daddy will hurt you worse than Mommy would. He's a mean bastard, that way."
She said this in a dry, childishly innocent way—clearly quoting her foul-mouthed stepfather without any real understanding of the words. "He will fuck you up."
Avery's eye got that sour-pastille droop again, and she went on. "Finally, threats of this nature are declassé. I know that you are . . . disadvantaged . . . by having been forced to live in a household with Actors, but be aware that in real life there is nothing that either of your parents can do to cause me the slightest discomfort. Insisting that your Grandmaman must beware of these undercaste creatures is indulging in fantasy—which is not only declasse, but dangerous, in a Businessman. You will never again repeat these ridiculous threats, nor will you make any mention of this pernicious fantasy that you have some—" Her mouth twisted distastefully. "—mental connection with your mother. You must put such childish notions behind you, and prepare to enter the full bright day of Business life. Do you understand, Faith?"
"Yes, Grandmaman."
"Good. Give me your hand."
Faith offered up her hand with such unhesitating readiness that Avery—impulsively, on the spot—decided to hold it, and give it a squeeze, rather than strike it.
Blood will tell, after all.
3
Hari sat on the edge of the expanded foam mattress, its ragged edge making the steel struts of the cot frame almost comfortable beneath the numb half-ache that always lurked inside his legs. He stared at the featureless white plastic of the opposite wall.
The Social Police had him in their jaws, and they were gonna chew him up good before they spat him out.
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